62 Norivay and the Norwegians 



century, been eminent in antiquarian and historical 

 studies. The names of the Danish antiquaries Nielsen, 

 Thomson, Worsaae, and others of a past generation, 

 will be familiar to many readers. They will know 

 that it was due to the researches of these men that 

 the records of the past, contained in the buried imple- 

 ments of prehistoric men, were first brought to light and 

 made the subject of serious and scientific study. To 

 them was due the first division of the prehistoric ages 

 into the now familiar Stone, Bronze, and Iron Periods. 

 The two Steenstrups, father and son, the two Mllllers, 

 father and son, our countryman George Stephens, are 

 other distinguished names in Denmark ; and in Sweden 

 the two Hildebrands, Montelius, Pederson, and many 

 others. Norway has produced linger, Holmboe, Schive, 

 Bugge, Bang, and Storm. But the most distinguished 

 among the antiquarian-historians of the north was 

 Peder Andreas Munch, the author of Bd Norslce Foil's 

 Historic, ' The history of the Norse people.' It is a 

 work of immense research, conceived upon the German 

 pattern, but wanting in the graces of style which mark 

 the best English and French histories. A contemporary 

 Norse historian whose work may be strongly recom- 

 mended to the Englishman (with a knowledge of Norse) 

 who is studying the history of the country, is J. E. Sars.^ 

 We now come to speak of the only two writers 

 who can claim a place in the Walhalla of the higher 

 European literature, Bjornson and Ibsen. I will speak 

 of Bjornson first, because, though he is the younger of 

 the two, it is best to leave Ibsen, as the greatest name 

 in Norse literature, to be spoken of at the end. 



1 Udsight over del Norske Historie (1873, etc.). 



